Thread of Doubt

by Jeff Shelby

I nodded, looking at the other stuff in the truck. A dresser, some boxes, a couple of lamps. A black guitar case jotted out from between some of the boxes.

  “Told me if it wasn't gone today he was gonna give it away,” Ricky said, frowning. “No idea what I'm gonna do with it all, but I didn't think it was cool for all of Patrick's stuff to get dropped off at Goodwill or wherever.”

  “Right,” I said.

  “Ruben and David were supposed to be here,” he said, glancing around. “But I guess they overslept or something.”

  “You find a place to stay?”

  “Staying with my sister for now,” he said. He rubbed at his chin. “But she just had a baby so I can't stay for long. I think David and Ruben are at Ruben's mom's for now.”

  None of those living arrangements sounded ideal, and I felt a twinge of sympathy for them. It sucked losing a friend and losing a house all at the same time.

  He squatted down to lift the chair into the bed of the truck and I moved closer to help him.

  “You know Thad Paulus?” I asked.

  He straightened, squinting at me for a moment. “What?”

  “Thad Paulus. Do you know him?”

  He shook his head. “I don't think so.”

  “Patrick's dealer? He had to have been around, right?”

  He blinked a couple of times and something flitted through his expression. “I don't remember.”

  I didn't say anything.

  “He might've been, yeah,” he finally said. He lifted up the armchair without my help and shoved it into the pickup. “Patrick had a lot of friends.”

  “A lot of friends that were dealing to him?”

  “Look, man,” he said, closing up the bed on the truck. “I wasn't into that shit. Ever.”

  “Heroin, you mean, right?”

  “Yeah. I've never touched that shit.”

  “What about pills?”

  Ricky fiddled with the latch on the truck bed. “Pills?”

  “Xanax, specifically.”

  He unlatched the bed, pulled the gate down, then pushed it close again. “What are you even talking about?”

  “I'm asking if you ever bought Xanax or something like it from Thad Paulus,” I said. “It's a pretty specific question.”

  “Why are you asking?”

  “Because I am,” I said. “You want me to remind you when and where you bought it?”

  “Are you a fucking narc or what?”

  “Nope. Just looking for some answers.”

  “What the fuck does asking me about buying pills from Thad have to do with Patrick?” he asked, his face screwed up in anger.

  Thad.

  That confirmed the first part I was trying to get at. I was fairly certain that Ricky knew him.

  And based on his reaction, I was dubious that Ricky had given the pills to Patrick. He genuinely had no idea why I was asking about them.

  So I made a decision.

  “The toxicology report came back on Patrick,” I said. “You know what that is?”

  He leaned against the truck. “Where they tell you what shit was in his blood?”

  “Yep,” I said. “He had Xanax in his system, but Thad said he never sold it to him.”

  He thought for a moment. “But I thought you said there was a needle in his arm? That he O.D.'d on heroin?”

  “That's what I thought,” I explained. “But there was barely any heroin in his system. Virtually nothing.”

  Ricky looked confused. “That doesn't make any sense.”

  “I agree.”

  “No, not what I mean,” he said, shaking his head. “So, maybe last year? Patrick got strep throat. He freaked out. Not because he was sick, but because he had to take pills. We were totally giving him shit because he hated swallowing pills. Like, hated it.”

  “So he never took a pill?” I asked. “Ever?”

  “Well, no,” Ricky said. “He did. But he absolutely hated it. It completely stressed him out.”

  “Was this when he was using or when he was clean?”

  Ricky frowned. “No idea. If I had to wager a guess, probably when he was clean. He wouldn’t have cared about it if he’d been high, you know? At least I don’t think he would have.”

  I thought about what Patrick’s mom had told me, how his addiction had started with pills. Maybe he had some sort of PTSD associated with the physical act of taking pills, like he thought it might start him down the path to using again. It was the only explanation that would make sense of what Ricky was telling me.

  But he still hadn't answered my question.

  “Did you give him any of the pills?” I asked.

  He didn’t answer right away, but I noticed the tells. His gaze shifted from me to the ground, and his hands shoved deep into his pockets. “No.”

  “But?” I prompted.

  “But what?”

  “There's something you're not telling me,” I said.

  He finally glanced back up, his mouth twisting back and forth as if he were physically trying to find the words he wanted to say. “Look, I didn't give Patrick anything I bought from Thad. Ever. I knew Patrick was trying to stay clean. Shit, I didn't even bring beer in the house because I didn't want it to seem like I didn't care about what he was going through.”

  I waited.

  He didn't say anything.

  “But?” I repeated.

  He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “I gave them to somebody else.”

  THIRTY TWO

  Ruben Stafford and David Schmitt finally showed up, with David behind the wheel of a Ford Taurus that was at least 20 years old. They pulled to the curb behind me and hesitated a moment before getting out.

  Ruben pushed the hair from his face and looked at me. “Hey.”

  “Morning,” I said.

  “What's going on?” David asked. He was holding a small cardboard cup of coffee in his hand.

  “You were supposed to be here an hour ago,” Ricky muttered.

  “My fault,” Ruben said, holding up his hand. “My phone was dead and the alarm didn't go off. Totally my fault.”

  Ricky shrugged it off.

  “You get everything?” David asked, surveying the back of the truck.

  “Yeah, I think so,” Ricky said. “I can’t get back in the garage but this is what was left outside.”

  The other two nodded as they scanned the contents of the truck bed.

  I didn’t wait to start asking questions. “David, why did you tell me to go talk to Erin?”

  He glanced at me, his eyebrows furrowed.

  Ricky's admission about giving the pills to someone else had momentarily tripped me up, but I thought I was starting to see things a little more clearly. I was still having trouble with the different characterizations I'd gotten of Erin versus what I'd witnessed in person. Had she really been an issue with the band or a victim of being the girlfriend of the most talented guy in the band?

  “When I was here before, you told me she and Patrick were having problems and that maybe I should go talk to her and she might know something,” I reminded him.

  David nodded. “Yeah.”

  “Why?”

  He frowned. “Why what?”

  “Why did you try to point me in her direction?”

  “Point you in her direction?” he repeated. “You asked if anyone else was close to him or something, or if we knew of anyone else who might know what was going on with him. Erin was the obvious choice.” He shrugged. “She was his girlfriend.”

  “Right,” I said. “I talked to her. They were definitely on again, off again. But it didn't really seem all that contentious. You sort of made it sound like they were constantly warring.”

  “They argued a lot,” David said, undeterred. “That's a fact. So I'm not sure what you're talking about.”

  “What I'm talking about is I'm wondering if you were trying to make Erin look bad for a reason,” I explained. “Did you want me to think she might've had something to do with his death?”
<
br />   “He killed himself,” David said, confusion written all over his face. “What could she have had to do with that? And why the hell are you in my face over this?”

  “Just trying to get to the truth.”

  “The truth?” David said, now angry. “What the hell are you even talking about, dude? The truth is you were the one that found him. You saw him, right? I think you saw the truth.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “And, look, not that I need to tell you shit, but I like Erin,” David continued. “Yeah, she could get on our nerves sometimes, but guess what? Pretty sure my girlfriend gets on everyone's nerves once in awhile. It's what happens in a band. We spend a ton of time together and shit happens. But don't try to make it like I don't like Erin or I'm blaming her for something. I liked her and even though they had their own shit going on, Erin took care of him when he fucked up. She cared about him.” He looked at Ruben. “I mean, shit. Tell him. You were the one who told me how bad things were between them.”

  “He told you?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” David said. He was still holding his cup of coffee, but he hadn’t taken a sip. “He saw them arguing more than I did, and he was the one worried she was going to fuck up the band.”

  THIRTY THREE

  I looked at Ruben. “That right?”

  Ruben stared down at the ground, refusing to meet my gaze. “Yeah, pretty much.”

  “Pretty much?”

  He didn't say anything.

  “Okay,” I said. “I've got another question for you then.”

  Ruben ventured a quick glance at me, and I could see the apprehension in his expression.

  “You remember some pills Ricky shared with you a while back?” I asked.

  His head snapped toward Ricky.

  Right before they pulled up, Ricky admitted that while he hadn't shared anything with Patrick, he had given some to Ruben. He couldn't recall exactly when, but he knew it had been within the last month or so.

  “What the fuck?” Ruben asked.

  “Yeah, what the fuck?” I said.

  “Did you give them to him?” Ricky asked.

  “Jesus Christ,” Ruben said, his face beginning to redden. “Why the fuck would it even matter?”

  “It matters because Patrick had Xanax in his system when he died,” I said. “More of that than anything else. I'm trying to figure out where it came from.”

  “And you think, what?” Ruben asked, his eyes narrowed, his jaw locked. “It came from me?”

  “I'm starting to think that, yeah,” I said.

  “What the hell is going on?” David asked, looking from me to Ruben and then to Ricky.

  Ricky shrugged and shook his head, but he knew what was going on. He knew why I was asking, and he knew where this was leading.

  “So, did you?” I asked Ruben. “Did you give him Xanax?”

  “I don't have to tell you shit,” he muttered.

  David took a step toward him, “Did you?” he asked, looking at his friend. “I didn't even know Patrick was using that stuff.”

  “We don't know that he was,” Ruben said. His cheeks were red, and a vein in his temple pulsed. “This guy's just saying he did.”

  “You want me to call his uncle and get him to confirm?” I asked. I reached into my pocket and held out my phone. “He's a cop, and he's the one who got the call about the toxicology report and told me what they found in Patrick's system.”

  That seemed to unsettle Ruben a bit. He bit his lip, chewing furiously at the corner his teeth moving so fast it looked like his lips were chattering.

  “What's going on here, Ruben?” Ricky asked, a little uncertainly. “Because I'm getting a weird vibe.”

  “This is all such bullshit,” Ruben mumbled. But there was something in his voice, something that sounded more like resignation than outrage.

  “What is?” I asked.

  He waved his hand in the air. “All of this. It's all total bullshit.”

  “You're going to have to be more specific.”

  He looked at Ricky with a dark expression. “You know what he was like. The last six months? You know, dude.” He cut his eyes toward David. “So do you. You both do. So don't act like everything was normal with Patrick.”

  “You already told me the band was having issues,” I said. “That's not news.”

  “We had more than issues, man,” Ruben said, then jabbed his finger in the direction of both Ricky and David. “And they know that, too.”

  Ricky and David exchanged looks.

  “Explain,” I said.

  “I don't need to explain,” Ruben said, snarling at me. “Patrick was fucking up this band.”

  THIRTY FOUR

  “Patrick had become impossible,” Ruben said. He looked at his two band mates. “Am I wrong?”

  David didn't say anything.

  “He was always...difficult,” Ricky admitted. “But it was just...him. His way.”

  “Bullshit,” Ruben said. “Yeah, he'd always been the leader and we gave him room to be creative and a perfectionist and all that. But you guys know he'd changed.”

  “How did he change?” I asked.

  “He was impossible to talk to,” Ruben said. He was talking fast now, animated, his voice charged with emotion. “Impossible to talk to. We weren't a band anymore. It was a fucking monarchy and he was the king. It didn't matter if the three of us thought something was a good idea. If he didn't like it, we didn't do it. Period. It was never like that before.” He shook his head. “He was ruining us.”

  I looked at the other two.

  They weren't saying anything to contradict Ruben's words.

  “Every time we got close to a deal of some kind, he shot it down,” Ruben said bitterly. “The last two times, he did it without even talking to us. I was fed up. It was like he was determined to just set everything we'd accomplished on fire. We weren't even getting local gigs anymore because Patrick had put out the word we only wanted 'big' gigs. Whatever the hell that meant. We were going backward, not forward. And it was his fault.”

  I didn't doubt anything he was saying. It seemed as if the band had started to break down because Patrick had a vision that not everyone else was on board with. It happened with bands or with any creative venture. It even happened with businesses, when partners disagreed about the direction to take their company.

  But I wasn't sure how that was relevant to Patrick's death.

  “Did you give Patrick Xanax?” I asked again. “Recently or at any other time?”

  Ruben started to say something, then stopped. He looked at the ground, shook his head. “Yeah,” he said with a bark of a laugh. “I gave him Xanax.”

  One of the other two whispered, “Shit,” but I wasn't sure which one.

  “We'd had an argument,” Ruben said. “I was super pissed. He'd turned down a meeting with a label in L.A.”

  “He did?” David said, looking confused.

  “Uh huh,” Ruben said, nodding. “He turned down the meeting. And didn’t tell us. The only reason I found out was because I was calling the clubs up in L.A. trying to get a couple of shows lined up. One of the bookers told me that she'd heard we weren't even coming up for meetings anymore and I said I had no clue what she was talking about.” He looked carefully at both Ricky and David. “She told me that he turned down the fucking meeting last week. And since I didn't know, I assumed you guys didn't know.”

  He stared at them, waiting for confirmation. The looks on their faces told us both everything we needed to know. They’d been clueless.

  “And that is not how we agreed this band would operate.” He looked specifically at David. “I know how much you'd been butting heads with him. I'd stayed quiet. But it seriously pissed me off that he did that. That isn't what we agreed to.”

  Ricky and David were nodding their heads.

  “I went to talk to him and we got into it,” Ruben said. “Big time. I let him have it. Told him it wasn't fair, that he was doing things to hurt the band,
and that if that's how it was gonna be, I was gonna bail.”

  “How did he respond?” I asked.

  Ruben squinted into the sunlight. “The way he always did. He was pissed, told me I didn't know what I was talking about and that I didn't understand what was best for the band. Typical arrogance. And, you know, arrogance is fine. We're all arrogant to some degree. But with Patrick it was like it became a thing, like he was trying to turn himself into a caricature of a lead singer in a rock band. And, look, I don't know if he was right or not about me knowing what was best for all of us.” He pointed a finger at me. “But I know that isn't how we all agreed to do things and that's what pissed me off the most. We agreed, the four of us, that it would be four equal votes on everything. But over the last six months?” He shook his head. “It was his vote that mattered, and his alone.”

  The other two again didn't contradict what he was saying.

  “So how did you end up giving the Xanax?” I asked.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. “So we did the yelling at one another thing and I stormed out.” He turned and pointed away from us. “Literally walked out of the house and right down that way. Didn't get in the car, just walked.” He turned back around. “After an hour, I came back.”

  “You came back,” I repeated.

  He nodded. “Because I didn't want to fight with him. I was all amped up and so was he. We just needed to chill the fuck out and get back on the same page. So I turned around and came back. He was sitting on the curb when I got here. I asked him if he wanted to go take the edge off and he said yeah.” He blinked several times, and I couldn’t tell if it was from squinting into the sunlight or something else. “We went into his room and grabbed some beers. We drank for a bit. We didn't say a whole lot, just drank and hung out.” He took a deep breath. “Then we started talking again, about before and everything, and I felt like it was getting tense. I didn't want that.” He glanced at his band mates and the defiance he'd shown earlier had ebbed away. He looked less sure of himself. “So I asked if he wanted to chill a little more. I told him what I had and he was in.”

  “He was?” I asked. “He knew you had pills?”